A historic manor house in Tuscany is Italy's best kept secret! 500 years old, beautiful cottages and villas.

In the picturesque hills of Tuscany, on the eastern edge of the Val d'Orcia valley, lies La Foche, one of the region's better-kept secrets. This is not surprising, as secrecy is an integral part of the estate's history.

Iris Origo, a famous biographer and her husband Antonio, used their vast property to hide refugee children, partisans, and escaped Allied prisoners of war in defiance of Italy's Fascist regime and the Nazi Third Reich. Even after the Germans occupied the villa at the end of the war, using it as a regional headquarters, the Origos continued to use the dense forests and hilly slopes around the estate to shelter refugees, helping to feed, clothe and ferry them to safety.

Thanks to Iris Origo's skillful management of this 15th-century manor, which was in a state of disrepair when they took ownership of it in 1924, she is credited with restoring the surrounding countryside, both economically and agriculturally. At the height of its power, La Foche included 7,000 acres of land, including a hospital, a school and nearly 60 farms, all built by Origo, as well as roads, irrigation canals and a host of other infrastructure.

Today, La Foche is run by Iris's daughter, Benedetta, and granddaughter, Kaia Lisi. Dozens of homes and cottages, including the villa itself, are available for rent to visitors interested in living in the historic area. Many are restored farmhouses from the early villa years, and all are furnished with private gardens and pools. (La Foche is also regularly rented out for movie shoots. If you watched the latest season of the popular HBO series The Heirs, you've seen La Foche for yourself.)

Day visitors can pay for a guided tour of the gardens (€10 for adults, children under 12 are free) from late March through October, often conducted by Caia herself or Benedetta (who was a child during the war). After your tour, stop by the garden store where you can find some of Origo's classics, as well as local pottery, perfume, linens and La Foche's famous olive oil, produced locally.

There are also plenty of attractions within walking distance of La Foche. The most famous are Castelluccio Castle, perched on the hill above the villa and dating back to the 13th century, La Foce Cemetery, where Iris and Antonio are laid to rest, and Monte Amiata, a 5,700-foot-high extinct volcano overlooking the valley.

A few steps up the road is Dopolavoro La Foce restaurant and bar, which serves a variety of traditional Tuscan dishes, many flavored with La Foce olive oil. All of the restaurant's produce is sourced from its own vegetable garden.

La Foche serves not only as a monument to the region's rich history, but also as a focal point for preserving local culture. The villa regularly hosts art exhibitions, both antique and contemporary, and every July it is also host to Incontri in Terra di Siena, a world-renowned chamber music festival. Founded in 1988 by renowned cellist Antonio Lisi (grandson of Origo) and director Alessio Bax, Incontri has brought together some of the finest classical musicians from around the world for 34 consecutive years.

Like La Foche itself, the experience of attending the festival is uniquely intimate and warm, where several hundred guests gather each night in the villa's main courtyard, as well as other nearby venues, to listen to chamber music performed by some of the world's finest classical soloists. In addition to the musicians themselves, famous recent guests at the festival have included Oscar winner Francis Ford Coppola and acclaimed California chef Dominic Crenn, among many others.

This year when I visited La Foche, one of the resident writers was acclaimed English author Louis de Bernières (author of the novel Captain Corelli's Mandolin). Despite all this, Lisi makes it clear that the Incontri Festival, while obviously a celebration of chamber music, culture, and cooking, above all hopes to continue the philanthropic legacy of her grandparents (and La Foche). The festival is first and foremost for the local community, which is emphasized by the low ticket prices. (Tickets for individual concerts sell for 35 euros and 10 euros for those under 25, while a season ticket for the seven-day festival costs 170 euros.) "There's a misconception about classical music, chamber music, that it's a nerdy, intellectual endeavor," Lisi told me before attending the festival. "People think you have to understand music. No, that's not what it's about. We want to make this experience accessible to everyone. "

After spending the night surrounded by the warm stone walls of La Foche's courtyard and the resounding harmonies of the Incontri musicians, I couldn't agree more that visiting La Foche doesn't require "understanding," but rather an experience.

Readers can learn more about La Foche (and book a stay) on the villa's website.